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049 - Chapter 31 - Part 10 · The American Revolution A Historical Overview Vol. 3

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  Speaker 1: Section forty nine of History the Rise, Progress and Termination
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  Speaker 1: of the American Revolution, Volume three by Mercy Otis Warren.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. History of the Rise, Progress, and
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  Speaker 1: Termination of the American Revolution, Volume three by Mercy Otis Warren,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirty one, Part ten. It has been justly said
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  Speaker 1: that there is seldom any medium between gratitude for benefits
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  Speaker 1: and hatred to the authors of them. A little mind
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  Speaker 1: is heard by the remembrance of obligations, begins by forgetting,
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  Speaker 1: and not uncommonly ends by persecution, and that that circle
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  Speaker 1: of beings which dependence gathers around us is almost ever unfriendly.
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  Speaker 1: They secretly wish the terms of this connection equal. Increasing
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  Speaker 1: the obligations which are laid upon such minds only increases
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  Speaker 1: their burden. They feel themselves unable to defray the immensity
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  Speaker 1: of their debt. Thus the names of many of the
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  Speaker 1: men will lay the foundations of American independence and defended.
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  Speaker 1: The principles of the revolution are, by the efforts of
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  Speaker 1: the artful depreciated, if not vilified. The ancient Persians considered
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  Speaker 1: ingratitude as the source of all enmities among men. They
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  Speaker 1: considered it an indication of the violess spirit, nor believed
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  Speaker 1: the possible for an ungrateful man to love the gods
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  Speaker 1: or even his parents' friends or country. The partiality to
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  Speaker 1: military honor as a tendency to nourish a disposition for
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  Speaker 1: arbitrary power, And wherever there is a tyrannic disposition, servility
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  Speaker 1: is its concomitant. Hence pride of title and distinction in
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  Speaker 1: an avarication for wealth to support it. Where these passions predominate,
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  Speaker 1: ingratitude is usually added. This makes a tripodium to lift
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  Speaker 1: the ambitious to the summit of their nefarious designs. Under
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  Speaker 1: an established despotism may inkind to generally more prone to
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  Speaker 1: bend than to resist, losing their ideas of the value
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  Speaker 1: of independence. The timid, the doubtful, and the indiscreet, for
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  Speaker 1: the most part, determined in favor of whatever weighs the
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  Speaker 1: appearance of established authority. It should be a lasting admonition
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  Speaker 1: which should forever prevent the vesting any individual or body
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  Speaker 1: of men with too much power. The people of the
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  Speaker 1: United States are bound together in sacred compact and a
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  Speaker 1: union of interests which ought never to be separated. But
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  Speaker 1: the confederation is recent and their experience immatured. They are, however,
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  Speaker 1: generally sensible that from the dictatorship of Sah to the
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  Speaker 1: overthrow of Caesar, and from the ruin of the Roman
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  Speaker 1: tyrant to the death of the artful Cromwell, deception as
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  Speaker 1: well as violence, have operated to the subversion of the
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  Speaker 1: freedom of the people. They are sensible that by a
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  Speaker 1: little well concerted intrigue and artificial consideration you may be
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  Speaker 1: obtained by exceeding the degree of real barat on which
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  Speaker 1: it is founded. They are sensible that it is not
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  Speaker 1: difficult for men of moderate abilities and a little personal
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  Speaker 1: address to retain their popularity to the end of their
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  Speaker 1: lives without any distinguished traits of genius, wisdom, or virtue.
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  Speaker 1: They are sensible that the characters of nations have been
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  Speaker 1: disgraced by their weak rtialities until their freedom has been
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  Speaker 1: irretreateably lost in their portex of foley, which throws are
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  Speaker 1: led to the g over the mind till awakened by
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  Speaker 1: the fatal consequences which result from arbitrary power disguised by
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  Speaker 1: specious pretexts. Amidst the general relaxation of manners. An ingenious
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  Speaker 1: writer has observed that the juvenile vigor of reason and
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  Speaker 1: freedom in the new world, where the human mind was
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  Speaker 1: unencumbered with a vast mass of usage and prejudice which
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  Speaker 1: so many ages of ignorance had accumulated to load and
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  Speaker 1: deformed society in Europe, brought forward those declarations of the
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  Speaker 1: rights of men, which hastened the emancipation of their own
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  Speaker 1: country and diffused light to others. It is equally just
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  Speaker 1: to observe that in the eighteenth century the enlightened writers
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  Speaker 1: of Europe had so clearly delineated the natural rights of
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  Speaker 1: men and the equal freedom of the human race, before they,
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  Speaker 1: by compact, had yielded apart for the preservation and safety
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  Speaker 1: of the whole as to have a powerful effect on
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  Speaker 1: public opinion. This had manifestly, in some degree broken the
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  Speaker 1: fetters that had long enthralled and dissipated the darkness that
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  Speaker 1: shrugged the mind under the influence of superstitious pigotry and
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  Speaker 1: their ideas of the divine right of kings. The colossus
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  Speaker 1: of tyranny were shaken and the social order ameliorated by
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  Speaker 1: learned sages who evinced that government, as elegantly expressed by
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  Speaker 1: one is not a scientific subtlety, but a practical expedient
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  Speaker 1: for general good. All recours to elaborate abstractions is frivolous
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  Speaker 1: and feudal. And the great question in government is not
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  Speaker 1: its source, but its tendency, not a question of right,
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  Speaker 1: but a consideration of expediency. All the governments in the world,
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  Speaker 1: the same right of ads, have been fortuitously formed. They
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  Speaker 1: are the produce of chance, not the work of art.
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  Speaker 1: They have been altered, impaired, improved, and destroyed by accidental
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  Speaker 1: circumstances beyond the foresight or control of wisdom. Parts thrown
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  Speaker 1: up against present emergencies form no systematical It was certainly
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  Speaker 1: not to have been presumed that these fratuitous governments should
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  Speaker 1: have surpassed the works of intellect and precluded all nearer
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  Speaker 1: approaches to perfection. Perfection in government is not to be
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  Speaker 1: expected from so imperfect a creature as man. Experience has
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  Speaker 1: taught that he falls infinitely short of this point. That,
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  Speaker 1: however industrious in pursuit of improvements in human wisdom, or
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  Speaker 1: however bold the inquiry that employs the human intellect either
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  Speaker 1: on government, ethics or any other science. Man yet discovers
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  Speaker 1: the deficiency of capacity to satisfy his researches, or to
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  Speaker 1: announce that he has already founded an erring standard on
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  Speaker 1: which he may rest. Perhaps genius has never devised a
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  Speaker 1: system more congenial to their wishes or better adapt to
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  Speaker 1: the condition of man than the American Constitution. At the
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  Speaker 1: same time, it is left open to amendments whenever its
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  Speaker 1: inperfections are discovered by the wisdom of future generations, or
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  Speaker 1: when new contingencies may arise, either at home or abroad,
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  Speaker 1: to make alterations necessary. On the principles of republicanism. Was
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  Speaker 1: this constitution founded on these? It must stand. Many corrections
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  Speaker 1: and amendments have already taken place, and it is at
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  Speaker 1: the present period as wise as efficient, as respectable, as free,
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  Speaker 1: and we hope is permanent as any constitution existing on earth.
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  Speaker 1: Footnote the beginning of the nineteenth century, which circumscribes the
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  Speaker 1: limits of the supplementary observations subjoined to the history of
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  Speaker 1: the Revolution. End of footnote. It is a system admired
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  Speaker 1: by statesmen abroad, envy by distant nations, and reviews by Americans.
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  Speaker 1: They pride themselves on this palladium of safety, fabricated at
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  Speaker 1: a dangerous crisis, and established on the broad basis of
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  Speaker 1: the elective voice of the people. It now depends on
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  Speaker 1: their own virtue to continue. The United States of America
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  Speaker 1: an example of the respectability and dignity of this mode
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  Speaker 1: of government. Notwithstanding the advantages that may be derived and
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  Speaker 1: the safety that may be felt under so happy a constitution,
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  Speaker 1: yet it is necessary to guard at every point against
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  Speaker 1: the intrigues of artful or ambitious men who may support
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  Speaker 1: the system which the inhabitants of the United States judge
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  Speaker 1: to be most conducive to the general happiness of society.
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  Speaker 1: It is now indeed the option of the sons of
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  Speaker 1: America to delegate such men for the administration of government,
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  Speaker 1: as will consider the designation of this trust as a
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  Speaker 1: sacred deposit, find them to the indispensable duty of aiming
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  Speaker 1: solely at the promotion of the civil, the economical, the religious,
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  Speaker 1: and political welfare of the whole community. They therefore cannot
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  Speaker 1: be too scrutinous on the character of their executive officers.
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  Speaker 1: No man should be lifted by the voice of his
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  Speaker 1: country to presidential rank, who may probably forget the Republican designation,
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  Speaker 1: and sigh to wield a septor instead of guarding sacredly
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  Speaker 1: the Charter from the people. It is to be hoped
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  Speaker 1: that no American citizen will here have to pay for nobility.
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  Speaker 1: The senators of the United States should be wise, her
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  Speaker 1: representatives are uncorrupt, the judiciary firm, equitabal and humane, and
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  Speaker 1: the bench of justice ever adorned by men uninfluenced by
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  Speaker 1: little passions, and adhering only to the principles of law
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  Speaker 1: and equity. The people should be economical and sober, and
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  Speaker 1: the clerture should keep within their own lives, which directs
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  Speaker 1: them to enforce the moral obligations of society, and to
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  Speaker 1: inculcate the doctrines of peace, brotherly kindness, and the forgiveness
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  Speaker 1: of injuries, taught by the example of their divine master.
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  Speaker 1: Nor should they leave the appropriate duties of their profession
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  Speaker 1: to discant on political principles or characters. But note it
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  Speaker 1: is true that this respectable order of men interested themselves
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  Speaker 1: on the great subject of opposition to the aggressions of
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  Speaker 1: the British Parliament. This was sometimes done at the request
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  Speaker 1: of legislators, without every aid necessary to awaken the people
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  Speaker 1: to a sense of their rights. But the ground on
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  Speaker 1: which the clergy came forward on political subjects was then
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  Speaker 1: very different from the present party disputes. There was, then,
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  Speaker 1: with few exceptions, a united opposition of the whole collective
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  Speaker 1: body of the people against a foreign power aiming to
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  Speaker 1: deprive them of their civil and religious priligious and to
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  Speaker 1: load them with taxes, impositions, and innovations novel and grievous.
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  Speaker 1: The dissensions are now wholly internal, which render the influence
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  Speaker 1: of every pious clergyman necessary to soothe the passions and
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  Speaker 1: heal the animosities and kindled among the people of his
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  Speaker 1: own particular charge. And the footnote. Such a happy combination
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  Speaker 1: of propriety and dignity in each department might prevent all
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  Speaker 1: apprehensions of danger to religion from the skeptical absurdities of
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  Speaker 1: unprincipled men. Neither the foolish, the learned, or licentious would
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  Speaker 1: be able to set the foundations of the Kingdom of Christ.
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  Speaker 1: In the present state of society and general information, there
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  Speaker 1: is no reason to fear the overthrow of a system
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  Speaker 1: by the efforts of modern infidels which could not be
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  Speaker 1: shaken by the learned, unbelievers of Greece, the persecutions of
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  Speaker 1: the Caesars, nor the power of the Roman Empire. All
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  Speaker 1: who have just ideas of the equal claims of mankind
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  Speaker 1: to share the benefits of her free and benign government
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  Speaker 1: and virtue sufficient to aid its promotion, were fervently prayed
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  Speaker 1: that the narrow passions of the selfish, or the ambitious
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  Speaker 1: views of more elevated minds, may never bringder fruitless the
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  Speaker 1: labors of the wise and vigilant patriot, who sacrifice much
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  Speaker 1: to this noble purpose, nor defeat the severe efforts of
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  Speaker 1: the soldier who fell in the field or stained the laurels,
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  Speaker 1: as such as have survived the conflict. However, literature has
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  Speaker 1: been improved in knowledge diffused by the pen of genius.
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  Speaker 1: In the industry of liberal minded and erudite instructors, there
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  Speaker 1: has been a conspiracy formed against the dissemination of republican
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  Speaker 1: opinions by interested and aspiring characters eager for the establishment
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  Speaker 1: of hereditary distinctions and noble orders. This is a conspiracy
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  Speaker 1: formidable for the wealth and talents of its orders in Europe,
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  Speaker 1: and not less so from the same description of men
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  Speaker 1: in America. They should stand as a beacon before the
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  Speaker 1: eyes of an infant republic recently established by the suffrages
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  Speaker 1: of the inhabitants of the United States, who already have
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  Speaker 1: had to fear. The progress of opinion which produced the
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  Speaker 1: American Revolution, might change its complexion, and they might yet
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  Speaker 1: be tyranny to depose more formidable than kings. Public opinion,
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  Speaker 1: when grounded on false principles and dictated by the breadth
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  Speaker 1: of ambitious individuals, sometimes creates a tyranny felt by the
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  Speaker 1: minority more severely than that usually inflicted by the hand
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  Speaker 1: of the sceptred monarch. From this tyranny of opinion often
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  Speaker 1: starts a political enthusiasm, which, as expressed by the cardinal dreats,
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  Speaker 1: would at one period exult to a throne, and at
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  Speaker 1: another conduct the enthusiasts to a gallows. This tyranny of
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  Speaker 1: opinion is spread or extinguished by factitious circumstances, sometimes combining
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  Speaker 1: to exalt the mind to the most sublime ideas of
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  Speaker 1: human freedom, at others beclouding it with prejudices which sink
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  Speaker 1: it into habitual serbility. One reason languish is until overwhelmed
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  Speaker 1: by a torpor, become too general to awaken without producing convulsions,
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  Speaker 1: more to be dreaded than submission, and too painful for
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  Speaker 1: the contemplation of benevolent minds. End of Section forty nine.